. >> it has probably not escaped your attention that the mantra "fiscal cliff, fiscal cliff, fiscal cliff" is played out every night on the evening news and the corporate news. what does that say to you? that you'd get "fiscal cliff, fiscal cliff," but not "job crisis, job crisis, job crisis"? >> it tells me, quite frankly, that many of these people, who by the way did not have much to say about the deficit when we went to war in iraq and afghanistan and didn't pay for it, i didn't hear from any people in the media complaining about that. what it tells me is that behind the corporate drive for deficit reduction is a significant effort to try to cut social security, medicare, and medicaid and other programs that working families need, not so much because of deficit reduction, because this has been the agenda of republicans and right wingers for a very long time. >> so how do you see this fiscal debate playing out in the next couple of weeks? >> we have, those of us who say that deficit reduction is a serious issue, i believe it is. but believe very strongly that at a time when we hav